The working poor: Struggling with poverty in Fairfield County

Betty Wong

Updated 10:40 pm, Monday, April 28, 2014

Haydee and Bob Lombard hug as Bob takes a break from splitting wood outside their rental home on Pepper street in Monroe, Conn. on Wednesday, April 23, 2014. The couple, who are also raising their grandson, struggle to make ends meet on Haydee's post office pension and the sale of firewood, which they also use to heat their residenence.

Haydee Lombard holds a piece of firewood, naturally shaped like a heart, given to her by her husband Bob, at their rental home in Monroe, Conn. on Wednesday, April 23, 2014. The couple, who are also raising their grandson, struggle to make ends meet on Haydee's post office pension and the sale of firewood, which they also use to heat their residenence.
Photo: Brian A. Pounds

Haydee Lombard, of Monroe, volunteers at the Monroe Food Pantry on Wednesday, April 23, 2014. Haydee and her husband Bob, who are also raising their grandson, struggle to make ends meet on Haydee's post office pension and the sale of firewood, which they also use to heat their residenence.
Photo: Brian A. Pounds

Haydee Lombard, left, of Monroe, hugs Monroe Food Pantry coordinator Wendy Jolls, in Monroe, Conn. on Wednesday, April 23, 2014. Haydee and husband Bob, who are also raising their grandson, struggle to make ends meet on Haydee's post office pension and the sale of firewood, which they also use to heat their residenence.
Photo: Brian A. Pounds

Bob Lombard splits firewood outside his rental home on Pepper street in Monroe, Conn. on Wednesday, April 23, 2014. Bob and his wife Haydee , who are also raising their grandson, struggle to make ends meet on Haydee's post office pension and the sale of firewood, which they also use to heat their residenence.
Photo: Brian A. Pounds

Haydee Lombard remembers the day her life changed 10 years ago. It was raining June 27, when she and her husband, Robert, learned that their 23-year-old daughter Kelly Ana had been brutally murdered in Bridgeport and they decided to raise their then 2-year-old grandson.

Haydee, 59, took early retirement from her job managing a post office, and they sold their Bridgeport home, moved to Massachusetts and then came back to Connecticut, now living in Monroe, so their now 12-year-old grandson could attend "a beautiful school."

Robert operated a tree business before a shoulder injury and Haydee is job hunting. Haydee is a volunteer and patron at the Monroe food bank.

"It's a very rich town with a lot of young families. But the original settlers here are struggling, like me," Haydee said. She is upbeat and helps others even when she doesn't have much, making care packages for fellow members of Trumbull's New Life Christian Church. "I'm a very positive person despite what has happened. The world will beat the snot out of you. Let's blow our noses and keep going," said Haydee, who plans to launch a women's support group.

Southwestern Connecticut is home to 14 billionaires, but it is also the home for a growing population of the working poor in the nation's biggest income gap. One of every 10 families is struggling near the poverty line. The working poor are more likely to be black or Hispanic, female heads of households and the elderly. Their ranks grew during the Great Recession and continue to grow amid an anemic economic recovery that's fewer low-wage, entry-level jobs. Fairfield County has a quarter of the state's higher-educated, low-income workers and more than half of those attended college or earned degrees.

Failing to recover

While Connecticut added 4,900 jobs in March, the manufacturing-reliant state has only regained 54.6 percent of the 119,000 jobs lost during the recession, unlike New York and Massachusetts, which have recovered to peak pre-recession job levels.

A Working Poor Families Project study showed that 21 percent, or 83,000, of Connecticut's 389,000 families with children and jobs had income below 200 percent of the 2011 federal poverty level. While the number is low compared with most states, the growth from 16 percent in 2007 was one of the nine fastest, joining recession-pummeled Michigan and Nevada. The 2013 federal poverty guideline is $11,490 annually for an individual and $23,550 for a family of four. A sole breadwinner in a four-member family has to earn $11.32 an hour for 40 hours weekly to top the poverty line.

About one-quarter of adults in low-income working families are cashiers, cooks, health aides, janitors, maids, retail salespersons or waiters/waitresses, said the Working Poor Families Project of Washington, D.C.

Less opportunity

While the working poor have historically been less educated, Connecticut Voices for Children's analysis of U.S. Census data found that more than half of Bridgeport-Stamford-Norwalk's low-income workers, or 99,084 workers aged 18-64, attended college or attained a bachelor's or master's degree.

"Few places in America offer less opportunity for economic mobility thanFairfield County. Most entry-level jobs don't come close to providing economic self-sufficiency, competition for these jobs is fierce, and housing is among the most expensive in the state," said Wade Gibson, director of the Fiscal Policy Center at Connecticut Voices for Children. "It is tough to be poor in Fairfield County."

Half of Southwestern Connecticut's food-insecure residents do not qualify for federal aid. A study by Feeding America, the Chicago-based hunger-relief charity, found 11.7 percent, or 107,110, of Fairfield County residents are food insecure and it would take more than $62 million, or $19.12 per week, to meet each food-insecure person's needs.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers developed a Living Wage calculator that showed a single adult living in Fairfield County needs to earn at least $12.07 an hour in a full-time job or $24.03 an hour to support a spouse and two children to pay for housing, food, child care, medical needs, transportation and taxes. In Bridgeport, the amounts would be $10.83 and $22.17; in Danbury $12.20 and $24.28; and in Darien, Norwalk, Stamford and Westport $13.22 and $25.71.

Nancy Coughlin, executive director of Neighbor to Neighbor, said 1,000 residents are served monthly by the Greenwich food pantry, up 55 percent since 2008. "More Greenwich families likely are eligible for free food but haven't sought out help due to a perceived stigma of needing the service," she said.

About 4 percent of Greenwich residents live below the poverty line.

"Sometimes it's difficult to accept help from a food pantry, but once a family walks through our doors, they see it is not a humiliating experience," Coughlin said.

Fred Carstensen, director of the University of Connecticut's Center for Economic Analysis in Storrs, said the planned minimum wage boost to $10.10 an hour by January 2017 from $8.70 is not a panacea for the working poor. "The problem in Connecticut is not wage levels. The problem is we're not generating economic growth. I don't think raising the wage three years hence is going to have much of an impact. A bit of inflation will eat away at the real value."

Carstensen, co-researcher of a 2013 report on Connecticut poverty, said the state started to invest in human infrastructure but needs to review best practices and invest in physical infrastructure. "We're doing much better than we were. But the only way to address the wage issue is if you create more jobs, and we haven't done that for 25 years."